Giving way

With yet another budget crisis looming it is kind of fun to browse what the the pundits write on the subject. The end of the world is coming yet again, with massive layoffs and a tanking economy due to the cuts, particularly (at least according to the Republicans) the cuts in military spending. This is a bit amusing since the Republicans have been crying for years that government spending is universally bad and that cutting such spending is the only way to save the nation. (I'm not sure how they get out of this one. If budget cuts do tank the economy what are they going to say, "Ops, sorry, we really have been lying to you for the last 32 years"?) This level of hypocrisy is so stark that many political observers seem compelled to comment on it. A few have even taken the next step and made the claim that military spending is out of control and a threat to the viability of the nation. There are even a very few conservative voices in that chorus.

So suddenly there are a lot of voices saying things that I kind of agree with, even discussions taking place on close-to-main-stream media. There is mention of actually reducing military spending in real dollars, not just slowing the rate of growth and calling it a "cut". There are even voices talking of closing most, if not all, off-shore military bases. Hell, I have even heard a whisper or two of drastically reducing (if not totally eliminating) nuclear weapons.

Mind you, I think the Republicans are full of shit when it comes to the "dept crisis". The only time they bring it up is when they are trying to get back into the White House. But I will agree with them on this, starving the beast is a good way to rein in a run-away bureaucracy. They want to starve a democracy that serves the majority of the people so the military corporate state (which serves only the elite) can reign supreme. Most of the people of the US, and the world, would be better off if the military corporate state were starved so a democracy that serves most the people can thrive. The two are mutually exclusive. Sadly, those in power want the former. Which is tragic (or perhaps tragically stupid) since everyone, including the elite, will do better in a thriving democracy than they are in a failing military state.

For we are, at the moment, a failing military state. It turns out our generals (of which we have way, way too many) are media burnished heroes with feet of clay. They lied us into wars, about the wars, when the wars would end, what the wars would cost, and what they would accomplish. They spent trillions upon trillions of dollars over the decades, and failed to see 9/11 coming. (Though novelists wrote such attacks into their stories for years.) The war on terror is self perpetuating - gestating two new terrorists for every one killed by a drone strike or night raid. Which the military must love since it means they can demand need more drones, more ships, more planes, more money, and "a free hand" to protect the nation. The security apparatus can now execute American citizens without any civilian oversight or review.

Maybe though, just maybe, the cross currents of history are twisting around to save us from ourselves. The Republican engineered "budget crisis" may backfire by throwing a spotlight on just how much waste, fraud and corruption is being sucked down the military black hole of a budget. (We will know that's is happening as soon as million dollar toilet seats once again make it into the headlines.) The war in Afghanistan is ending badly and will surly be regarded, along with the one in Iraq, as a colossal waste of human life; taking some more of the shine off of the military and both of the political parties that were so quick to climb onto the war wagon. If the budget cuts throw thousands of defense workers into unemployment lines who are they going to vote for next time around? The Democrats who will be blamed for cuts defense spending that put them out of a job, or the Republican / T-party types who have sentenced them and their families to poverty by eliminating the social programs they now need to survive? The two party system serving the corporate / military system will have conspired to betray millions of Americans in a most glaring way.

I am still off the reservation, but it appears that a few on the reservation are looking in my direction. That doesn't mean the US of A is on any kind of a healing path, that die may be cast. One can hope though. What if the working assumption becomes how the two-party system controlled by unregulated corporate money supporting an out-of-control military is utterly failing the citizens of the country? (And, for that matter, of the world.) How would it be if large numbers of people realized that a 9.4 percent cut in defense discretionary funding and a 10 percent cut in mandatory defense spending (though I am having trouble believing that this actually means a cut in military spending of close to 20%) isn't really a disaster but just getting close to the numbers needed to avoid becoming a failed military state?

The Drone War is coming out of the closet. Even some on the far right may start to wonder just how much they have given up by handing the military a blank check for both spending money and eliminating civil liberties. They may even start to understand that the Second Amendment means nothing if the First has been given away. (Actually the Second Amendment doesn't mean anything now though it is possible the the right wing will never figure that out.)

Fundamental changes in the two party system? A serious slashing of the military? Could such actually be in the offering? There is already a better than even chance that civil rights for gay people has turned a corner with religious fundamentalists and social conservatives having been thoroughly routed. Some see a growing realization that global climate change really is a scientific fact as exposing the anti-intellectual, anti-science crusaders for the charlatans they are. Gun violence getting some of the scrutiny it deserves. The lost drug war is getting some press and there is even a sliver of light being cast on the appalling failure that is America's privatized prison system. Even the death penalty is squinting a little from the light being cast its way.

The reservation is under siege from itself. The America that embraced the failed policies of war, robber baron capitalism, and religious fundamentalism, is showing definite signs of cracking under the pressure. What grows up in its place it yet to be determined. The chances are good the first couple of tries will be false starts, but at least they will be starts of some kind.